Chapter 4 #2
Heat pressed against my back in a sudden burst of comfort, and I realized Graysen had stepped behind my trembling body. His arms came around my heaving chest, firm and sure, pulling me into a cocoon of safety. I clutched his forearms hard.
“Breathe,” he urged, one hand stroking gently down my arm. “I’m here, Nelle. I’ve got you.” His voice was calm and steady. An anchor against the rising fear shaking through me. “Look closer. There’s light.”
When my eyes attuned themselves to the darkness, I realized a pocket of lavender light spilled across craggy stone at a lower level in what appeared to be a staircase carved out of black rock. I sucked in a deep breath, my heartbeat slowing, but it still didn’t completely calm my tattered nerves.
“You okay?” he asked, and I swallowed against the suddenly dry mouth, nodding. I didn’t know why I bothered lying. Warm lips met my temple in a soft, lingering kiss, and he murmured, “My brave, sweet liar.”
Cold air swirled between us, carrying a flicker of panic with it, when Graysen unwound his arms and stepped aside.
He scooped up the canvas bag, then laced his fingers through mine, giving a gentle, reassuring squeeze.
I let out a thin breath on a wobbly smile and squeezed back.
My other hand trembled as I set the limp paper bag of treats on the shelf beside me, the sunglasses too.
I prepared myself for the dark descent, wondering if the scarce light was going to be enough to stop me from collapsing in terror.
There came a soft rustling sound of fabric, and I glanced over with curiosity.
Graysen gripped the knotted-bone hilt of a rather vicious-looking dagger.
“Where did that come from?” I hadn’t noticed any weapons strapped to his figure.
“I have secret pockets on everything I wear,” he winked cockily. “Like the deadly weapon stashed inside my boxer briefs.”
“Oh my gods,” I scoffed, then burst into laughter, shaking my head.
“That’s not the only thing you cried out this morning,” he taunted, taking a step forward.
“You can talk, Crowther,” I shot back, rolling my eyes and striding forward to match his pace. I tilted my chin at a haughty angle. “At least I wasn’t horrendously loud. I’m surprised the whole Keep didn’t hear you. All that godsdamned moaning you did was louder than a pornstar faking an orgasm.”
His shoulders quaked with his soft laugh, the canvas bag jostling with the movement. Amusement turned swiftly to seriousness. “I didn’t fake mine.”
“I might have.”
“Liar,” he hissed, breaking into a grin.
A moment later, I realized I’d been so distracted by the banter that we were already inside the staircase, moving down the crumbling steps.
The summery fabric of my dress swirled around my thighs, caught in the restless currents spiraling upward from below.
Strands of hair twirled across my face, and I pushed them away as waves of lavender rippled over our figures, shimmering each time we passed through a patch of light.
And curiously, I saw the source—small, otherworldly creatures trapped in glass bowls fixed to the stone wall.
Pix fluttered inside, their wings emitting a soft purple glow.
“You feel it now?” he asked.
“Yes,” I whispered. How could I not? The dark magic was so powerful that the staircase had become a wind tunnel of blustering energy roaring up from the black deep, a wild storm crackling through the cold, dank air.
Graysen’s shorter locks shifted like wind sweeping across a dune, rustling wild reeds.
As we continued downward, I edged closer and wrapped my other hand around his forearm, needing his comfort and strength. “How in Nine Hells did your mother meet a Horned God?”
His arm brushed against mine. “No fucking idea.”
Somewhere below came a sudden scuttling of tiny claws on stone. I shuddered with revulsion. “Ew, rats.”
Graysen swept a comforting stroke of his thumb across mine.
“We have a family tradition my aunt started years ago. A day spent hunting rats in the Keep. All of us, the staff included. The Great Rat Hunt,” he chuckled, the rich sound striking off the scarred walls.
“It’s an inside joke between her and my dad. ”
It sounded silly and fun, and I almost asked about it. But then I remembered myself and bit it back. I didn’t want to talk about Valarie.
“My aunt… She never used to be like this,” Graysen continued quietly.
I stiffened.
“I guess you won’t believe me when I say that she once was kind, compassionate, and shy.” There was such wistfulness in his tone. “She was the—”
I cut him off. “No. You’re right, I don’t believe you.” I didn’t want to hear any more about Valarie. “It doesn’t matter what she used to be like, it’s only what she is now.” A cruel, malicious woman.
I pressed my mouth into a grim line and fixed my gaze straight ahead, navigating the downward steps, and I heard his quiet, defeated sigh. But he respected my wishes and didn’t talk about her any further.
We followed the staircase curling beneath the earth, sipping on stale air and pushing through the vibrating might that charged like wind barreling down from a mountaintop.
The dark magic was clearly leaking through the exposed brick wall in the utility closet.
Graysen had sensed it instantly, yet strangely, I hadn’t.
I was about to prod at that particular mystery when Graysen stopped short, yanking me back with a swift, instinctive motion and angling himself in front of me. A faint bell rang somewhere below, followed by an off-beat pattern of footfall, and I strained to see into the darkness.
“What is it?” I whispered, clutching his arm, trying not to tremble.
“Something is hobbling down the stairs below us,” he replied quietly, his entire body rigid, blade raised. “I don’t know what or who it is.”
A few tense breaths passed. Then his grip on my fingers eased.
“They’re gone now.”
At the gentle tug on my hand, I resumed descending the steps.
Down, down, down.
We continued until we reached a landing, and there we stopped. The staircase carried on farther into the dark, and I had a feeling it led to the catacombs beneath Ascendria.
But to our left stood an enormous door.
“Holy hellsgate,” I breathed in utter wonderment as we both swiveled around to face it. I felt like a small child before its looming height. Power seeped through the slender gaps along the frame, brushing against my skin and shivering the ends of my scarf.
A beast’s leathery head inspired the shape of the wrought-iron doorknob with twisted horns, vicious fangs, and a wicked forked tongue.
As for the door itself, I couldn’t make out the image painted across it.
A pattern of sorts. Time had worn away most of the paint, leaving only hints of blues and reds and dirty yellows.
Graysen drew a deep breath and expelled it out on a wary note before lifting his fist and knocking. The sound echoed ominously. We waited in the darkness, in the silence.
A sound stirred on the other side, of muffled footsteps, the rhythm ponderous. We drew back as whoever it was reached the door. The beast-shaped handle rattled, twisting sharply, and Graysen shifted closer, my fingers tightening around his in apprehension of what we were about to encounter.
The door swung open and a silver bell above it chimed—tink, tink, tink—like the kind in old-fashioned shops announcing a customer. Power blustered outward in a sudden gust, tugging at the loose edges of my dress. The air itself pulsed with the sheer might of it.
It seemed we were not who the Horned God expected to see. As he pulled the entrance wide, he began, “Did you forget something…” but the words died as his gaze dropped and found us standing there. I craned my neck back to stare up, up, up.
Towering before us was a Horned God. Honeyed candlelight haloed his massive figure, brushing broad shoulders.
He was a blend of human and goat, and a pinch of elemental with the thin wisps of smoke shimmering off his body.
Balled in a hand was a rag stained dark green, almost black.
Blood, I realized, maybe from a lesser creature.
I glanced at Graysen. Awe slackened his features, and a ghost of a smile shadowed his mouth.
So this was the Horned God his mother had befriended.
The Horned God’s long ears twitched, the movement scattering tendrils of smoke to curve around his enormous ram horns.
“How did you get here?” he asked in a deep, booming voice, and the dreadful, grainy sound of it sent a shiver down my spine.
Old. As old and menacing as the age-bitten rock his lair was carved within.
Graysen let go of my hand to point in the direction we’d come. “From up there. From the market above.”
Skepticism cracked sharp and swift. Florin grunted, his eyes narrowing, the horizontal pupils dilating.
From the wide, flat nose downward, Florin’s face was human with thick lips, chin, and jawline, but the upper portion was goat-like with fur the same dark shade as his skin.
His eyes were widely set apart with pupils slashed horizontally.
Eyes that were blood-red. Eyes that sliced to where Graysen pointed up the stairs.
And I swore a dawning wonder flickered in his gaze when it returned to us.
We remained where we stood, waiting with bated breath.
Florin squinted, his interest running along the harrowing edge of the wyrmbone dagger in Graysen’s hand. He inspected Graysen, languidly searching his face, and spoke carefully. “I’ve not had a visitor from the Houses for a long time. Who are you?”
Graysen bowed deeply, as was customary.
I did not.